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Britain is building one of the world’s most expensive railways

(www.cnn.com)
61 points peutetre | 2 comments | 20 Nov 24 13:51 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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ajeet_dhaliwal ◴[20 Nov 24 18:21 UTC] No.42196711[source]▶
Imo, as someone who lived in central London for 9 years with no car, the Uk puts ideology first oft n. Obsessed with trains. They are unreliable and expensive. Even the London Underground doesn’t pay for itself with tickets, needing subsidies from tax payers. It may be best to build wider roads and highways and everyone buy a car.
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ajoseps ◴[20 Nov 24 18:58 UTC] No.42197040[source]▶
I don’t live in London but have traveled for work weeks at a time. Coming from a car focused area, I think this sentiment is surprising. I think the London Underground is one of the best things about London and preferring to widen roads and highways sounds extremely backwards for me who lived in a very car focused area. I don’t think it’s appreciated just how great the underground is compared to other transport systems around the world.
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1. ajeet_dhaliwal ◴[20 Nov 24 19:07 UTC] No.42197105[source]▶
I’ve lived both, car centric US/Canada and London. At first public transport seems great but over time the realization sets in about how uncomfortable it is (no seat warmers, cleanliness, having your face in people’s armpits) and inconvenient it is (not door to door) and that wouldn’t be so bad but then the unreliability (signal issues) and expense of the tickets and tax subsidies makes it a bad deal. It should exist as an option, I’m glad it does so I can have less traffic on the roads, but it’s overrated. HS2 in the article is this expensive just to build, imagine the maintenance costs for the next century. Whether you use it or not, residents will have to pay for it.
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2. avianlyric ◴[23 Nov 24 00:13 UTC] No.42218388[source]▶
> tax subsidies makes it a bad deal.

Unlike roads? How exactly do you think roads are paid for, if not by 100% tax subsidies? TfL doesn’t get any tax subsidies anyway, the Tories got rid of that years ago.

> imagine the maintenance costs for the next century. Whether you use it or not, residents will have to pay for it.

And somehow this doesn’t apply to roads?